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Deer Country Mod ([personal profile] reddosmod) wrote in [community profile] countryclub2021-11-19 02:06 am
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November 2021 Test Drive Meme

NOVEMBER 2021 TDM
Another month, another test drive meme! Our test drive memes are open to anyone interested - regardless of whether or not you join our game!

All Test Drive Memes are game canon. Players can choose to keep their TDM threads canon or not. TDM threads can be used for AC and can be used as your writing sample for your application.

Our TDMs serve as a way to build into the actual lore and worldbuilding of Deer Country and we strongly encourage everyone to enjoy and participate! Current players are always welcome to pull prompts from the TDM to reference on the Network or bring into logs as well as tag out to new characters top-leveling on the TDM itself.

Characters will always be able to actively die during TDMs as this is an extremely dangerous world. You can still have this be game canon! Check out how character death in Deer Country works here.

If you have any questions about the TDM, please ask down below!

IMAGE DESCRIPTORS IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE

Prompt One
[Image One: Perfect dog curled up in falling snow, tilting head to side.]
[Image Two: Dead man floating in water with signs of hypothermia.]

Prompt Two
[Image One: Frozen ship wreck.]
[Image Two: Frozen staircase.]

Prompt Three
[Image One: Bloody tentacles attacking soldiers.]
[Image Two: Tentacles coming out of astronaut suit.]

NOT SO STANDARD ARRIVAL
WHEN: November - December
WHERE: The Farther Shores/The Boardwalk
CONTENT WARNINGS: Drowning, freezing to death, trapped under ice, hypothermia, frost bite.


Washing up on the Farther Shores towards the end of November and the beginning of December isn't the best experience. Normally there are some Sleepers who can show up without a hitch, but as winter nears, the waters begin to freeze and it gets increasingly dangerous to arrive on the Farther Shores. Many Sleepers wind up trapped under ice. Wakers must especially be diligent this month to make sure they don't lose valuable Sleepers. Drowning and freezing to death is extremely probable. If you're lucky, you might be able to break through the ice to shriek for help. Let's just hope someone's around to hear you!

Most of the Boardwalk has been converted to save the Sleepers that do make it. Tents have been put up and inside are mattresses stuffed with hay and blankets made from wool and furs. Contained coal and wood fires keep the tents cozy, but it might take a while before you get feeling back into your toes. If you have warmblood or coldblood you will not have nearly as bad of a time with all of this. Some coldblood Sleepers might not even notice the cold! Might be good to put them on the frontlines for helping people out.

Another oddity this month is that most Sleepers seem to arrive at night rather than the typical daytime arrivals. Maybe it's because daytime hours are much shorter in December...But maybe it's something else too. This has led to Wakers making search parties to try and find Sleepers in the pitch-black night. It's a precarious situation and all hands on deck are strongly encouraged.

The Dog Keeper has come out to help the efforts. His dogs can be seen running frantically around the beach to help find people buried under ice and to help break through the ice to get them to safety. Dogs are available to help Sleepers swim to the Farther Shores, and they are also available to help Sleepers warm up by cuddling up afterward. There isn't much food to offer at this time, but you can still expect to be greeted with some hot soup. It might leave you hungry, but it definitely seems to help warm you up!
FROZEN RELICS
WHEN: End of November, early December
WHERE: Farther Shores/Pthumerian Ocean
CONTENT WARNINGS: Mutilated corpses, frozen bodies, possible frost bite/hypothermia, disaster-centric setting.


Sleepers aren't the only thing struggling in the Pthumerian Ocean this time of year. Boats come crushing in through the ice, frozen over completely by blistering winds. The ocean seems to be spitting up boats from times long past, leaving their skeletons strewn along the Farther Shores. Some are small boats, barely worth a second glance, but others are massive vessels, cutting intimidating shapes against the dark sky beyond.

Some Sleepers may even wake up in the water-submerged bowels of these boats, having to navigate a metallic graveyard. Other Sleepers might just have the sense to go and scavenge the boats for useful supplies and parts. Valuable metals can be extracted from the boats as well as other mechanical pieces - but not just that. Sleepers who explore thoroughly will discover small non-magical items from their home might be on the boats, floating in the water, or in random debris. Some boats are trader boats, having entire crates of sealed food goods like rare chocolates, fruits, and other food that is difficult to find this time of year.

You will want to thoroughly bundle up for this trip because it's much colder inside of the boats than it is outside. It's as if they have been transformed into giant freezers. Coldbloods may be able to provide their companions with steady warmth, even if their abilities are typically more ice-centric. It seems like coldbloods can manipulate the cold in these boats to be less intense. Some of the boats may have more grim discoveries: dead bodies, some skeletal, others still with the flesh intact and frozen over. It's never easy to discover the corpses of those who have tried to brave the ocean and failed.

It's easy to believe that what killed these people was the ocean or the cold...But the more bodies you discover, the more thoroughly you explore these shipwrecks, you begin to have a creeping feeling that these aren't ordinary crashes. These weren't natural causes. Some of the bodies look as if the chests had been ripped open while others, the faces have been completely distorted beyond recognition. There is an undeniable presence of something on these ships and you have a feeling whatever killed these people has now been brought to Trench...Great!
THE THINGS THEY CARRIED
WHEN: During Bone Season
WHERE: Throughout Trench
CONTENT WARNINGS: Parasitic monsters, tentacle horror, crushing/bursting styles of death, a form of beasthood, mild auto-cannibalism/self-harm.


You notice specks of blood that seem to appear from nowhere among the snowdrifts. When you pay closer attention, you may see more blood dripping...up. It doesn't look like any Sleeper Blood you're familiar with but instead appears to be black-blue colored, reflecting like glass, bubbling up out of the ground. It makes a small, glass-shattering noise when it appears before it bubbles back into the ground. It leaves a rotten odor in its wake.

The moment you get too close to the blood, even a foot away, it will expand rapidly. Bloodied tentacles will grow out of the blood and start violently lashing around at whatever living creatures are nearby. These tentacles are powerful, impervious to any weapons not reinforced with Sleeper Blood. They will grab up people and break their bodies, throwing them through the air or tearing them apart, seeming to nourish from the bloodshed.

However, some people are less lucky than a swift death. Some of these tentacles may snap right into your chest, opening up some blood portal into your soul, where this Thing will consume you. On the outside, this looks like a rush of this black-blue blood rushing into a Sleeper and then nothing. You'll feel disoriented and strange at first but will become increasingly agitated, violent with those around you. You will start to gnaw at your fingers to shed your new temporarily altered blood. Eventually, you will begin to attack other Sleepers, able to summon these bloodied tentacles and destroy anything in your path.

But this is a parasitic monster you carry. It eats away your sanity until nothing is left, and then the tentacles will burst out of you, your body left to ruin. Parasitic monsters can be removed by Blood Ministers or by forcing vileblood into the infected's body. The vileblood seems to purge the parasite without killing the host body...As long as you don't use too much. Once the parasite has consumed the body, there is no saving the Sleeper except through death. These parasites can be tracked back to the boats where people can find streaks of the unusual black-blue blood throughout the boats. This blood can be contained and isolated by darkbloods and/or Architects.
CODING
vilent: (wince)

[personal profile] vilent 2021-11-23 10:37 am (UTC)(link)
(Jinx screams like a wounded animal, wild, scared, and furious, but Vi is stronger than her. It occurs to her that she could hold them together like this until they healed. She could press the broken halves of them together until something took. It also occurs to her that the last time she made Powder do something that she didn't want to do, everybody around them died.

A breath of fear leaks out of her.

Can't help it. Some cuts run deep.)


It's okay, (she repeats, the whisper as much for herself as it is for her sister.) It's going to be okay.

(She presses her temple up against Jinx's, buries her nose into her hair, clings until it feels cruel. And then she lets her go, carefully at first, and then all at once.)
felldownawell: (💣 I'm really getting bored!)

[personal profile] felldownawell 2021-11-23 07:56 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Right now, that's the best description for Jinx. She fights against Vi as best she can given her position. But at the same time, she's fighting against the urge to sink her teeth into Vi.

If only holding each other tight would repair the damage that time and perceived betrayal have wrought. Though Vi isn't the problem here. If anything, the fact that it's her and not some stranger is the only reason she hasn't tried to rip her apart.

The moment she's released, Jinx staggers back. Her mind a swirl of demands that she doesn't want to make happen.

Tear her apart.


D̴̯͉͔͚̅͊̄̃͑̋E̝̣̮ͯ͋ͬͬ̏̆̚V̳̮͇̯͉ͯ̈́O̘̳̤͒̋͐͂͂̚Ů͏̭͕R̥͓͓̫̬̳͑͢ her.

Make her like ̛̹̆͛̑̾̇ͨ̄U͙̱̻͙̯̮͆̒̔͟S͉̻̘̐̐̽̿.̜͙̮͙̲̓ͪ̊̿͟


As this is happening, Vi might notice that something seems to be crawling beneath Jinx's skin.
]

NO! [ She yells, half-turned away from Vi as if someone is standing at her side. Her hands once again go to her head as she falls to he knees, grinding her teeth.

After a moment she looks back up at her.
] S-somethin--

[ Wrong. Something is so very wrong and she can't even properly express it because if she uncurls she knows she'll do something to hurt Vi. ]
vilent: (uh oh)

[personal profile] vilent 2021-11-23 09:58 pm (UTC)(link)
(She does notice. For all that Jinx and Powder blur out around the edges, one ending, another beginning, a complicated system that Vi doesn't fully understand, there's always been a sense of mastery underlying it. Jinx is very specifically off the rails. It's calculated. She knows what she's doing, but Vi can't interpret it. Maybe Jinx is the only one who can.

So when her sister sinks to her knees and screams again, hands at her head–

The control slipping, noticeably–

Vi's eyes widen, hands gathered into loose fists. All she's ever done is hit to make the problem stop, and now there's nothing here for her to hit.)


What, (she says, caught up. Worry bubbles in her throat, makes her voice raw when she tries again,) What, Powder. (Jinx's eyes are two big, black holes in her face. Vi drops to her knees beside her, hands hovering before they reach out, and gently press over the backs of Jinx's. She'll hold on, with her. She won't let go.)
felldownawell: (💣 Just a little bit of energy!)

time for little body horror

[personal profile] felldownawell 2021-11-23 11:26 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Jinx's control slips more often than she would like, but it's always due to a specific trigger. But this... this has left her unable to determine any specific trigger. Vi being here hasn't made it better but she's not the reason. Something's happened. Something is in her that doesn't belong. She's sure of that.

Jinx begins to respond to being called Powder, mouth opening only to let out a pained cry as whatever it is beneath her skin moves violently. It rushes toward the warmth of Vi's hands over her own. A moment later blue-black oozes from the wounds on Jinx's fingers and seems to curl of its own accord. Little tentacles reaching to grab at the other woman's wrists.
]
vilent: (wince)

delicious 🦑

[personal profile] vilent 2021-11-24 03:49 am (UTC)(link)
(Some part of Vi knows she shouldn't have said that but her mouth formed the word automatically. She's unused to saying Powder's other name, unwilling. Doesn't want to lose what little of her sister she has left, and hasn't accepted that she already has, and there's no time to think about that, not with Jinx's scream cutting like a hot knife through her guilt.

The tendrils snake around Vi's wrists. She hates that. She doesn't like being held.

She grunts and tries to tug herself away, but she can't. She can't get free, and the tendrils are squeezing her far too tight.)


Wh–

(Oh, shit–) Is this you?? (STOP?)
felldownawell: (💣 What we need here)

[personal profile] felldownawell 2021-11-24 04:29 am (UTC)(link)
[ Perhaps she'll get used to it if they ever have the chance to reconcile. Because Powder is gone. She made that choice with Silco's death. With what felt like a rejection from Vi.

Jinx lifts her head in confusion. She tries to pull her hands away but they're held fast by the tendrils of blood. She panics, tries to rip herself away but the tendrils are already winding themselves up Vi's forearms, trying to find skin to burrow into so they can infect her as well.
]

NO! [ She yells again, violently pulling herself away. She manages to free one hand, but not without causing the blood to tear away from skin from her fingers in the process. The blood from freed hand goes from a near-solid state to liquid the moment it loses the connection with Jinx. ]

C-can't hurt her. Not Vi! Not Vi.

[ She curls her free hand in against her chest while trying to pull the other free, but the tendrils are stubborn. ]
vilent: (punchy)

body horror again

[personal profile] vilent 2021-11-25 10:48 am (UTC)(link)
(It's definitely not her. Doesn't even belong to that manic, purple gleam in her eyeballs. Vi lurches backward but the tendrils come with her, slithering up her bandages. She shrieks, but Jinx rips her hand free and breaks it, changes it. Dark, wet blood, explodes into being, marking her skin, dribbling off onto her jacket, the floor.

Not on the other side where she's still attached. Those tendrils have found a warm, and soft purchase.

Pain explodes up her arm, dizzying in its intensity. Like something trying to push down, and into her veins, threading through her flesh, a needle through fabric. The dark green vileblood that floods up in response belongs to Vi, but she doesn't know it yet, she's busy pulling at blood-thick tendrils, yanking them out of her body, breath coming in ugly, wrenching gasps.)


Help me. (Ohhh fuck it hurts so fucking bad–)
felldownawell: (💣 I'm really getting bored!)

[personal profile] felldownawell 2021-11-25 10:56 pm (UTC)(link)
[ It's that blood that saves Vi. It only takes a moment for pain to explode through Jinx's arm as her altered blood comes into contact with Vi's. It's like something burning through her. The blood recoils as a nearly inhuman screech explodes from Jinx's mouth. She reels back, curling into a ball as she presses both of her ruined hands against her chest.

Run!

Fͤ̇ͯ̈Ĺ̓̕E̝̣̳̔ͭ̌̈͡Ĕ̴̹̭ͫͬ̆̆̏!

She hurts U̧̫ͩS̝̱͙̫̥̞͎̃͆̉̒͂ͩͦ!


The pain coursing through her makes her legs feel like jelly and her stomach turn. She gasps, tears burning hot lines down her cheeks. The blood in her writhes, causing her veins to visibly rise and pulse, dark against her pale skin.
]